Bootcamp Back Pain Exercises

If you are a bootcamp instructor, make sure the injuries your bootcampers encounter are on the decline.

I got this e-mail from an Exercises for Injuries blog reader:

Just started teaching bootcamps. I have encountered people who have issues with their backs (mostly L4-L5). Some have had surgery to relieve pain and another has had it fused.

Rick, do you have an suggestions on exercises my bootcampers with low back injuries should definitely stay away from?

Rick , thanks for any help.

DK

3 Tips to Eliminating Bootcamp Low Back Pain

#1) No Plank Back Pain

Planks are great core stability exercise for the back. When I taught my bootcamps last summer in the park, this was my go-to exercise. Planks are a great exercise for your bootcampers with low back injuries. You need to make sure your bootcampers have the flexibility, activation, strength and endurance to perform the plank properly.

If your bootcamper reports any kind of pain in their back when they do a plank or any variation of a plank, you can increase the angle of the plank in order to eliminate their back pain.

For example, if your bootcamper is doing a ground plank and it brings on lower back pain, you can get them to plank on a step or stability ball.

If they still have lower back pain, you can get them to plank against a wall.

Getting them to increase the angle of the plank, decreases the stress and force that is put on the back. Keep increasing the angle until you find the right load that your bootcamper’s core can handle.

#2) Crunches are Out!

For someone that has a back injury, crunches are out.

Crunches replicate the mechanism of most back injuries. There are a lot of other abdominal exercises that you can do to hit the abdominals better and not injure the back. The one that I would recommend, I talked about above, the plank. There is a lot of effective and safe abdominal exercise variations you can do other than the crunch. I go through a stack of them in the Core Stability of the Lower Back course.

#3) Weighted Twisting is Out!

Another movement that is dangerous for people with back injuries is weighted twisting. For example, you get them to hold a sandbag or medicine ball and then get them to twist or side-throw. These kind of exercises are out. With the weight in their hands it puts compression on the vertebral discs and then twisting moves the disc in a direction that is not good form for them.

Well that is it.

I hope this helps you with your bootcampers with back injuries.

If you have any tips on eliminating bootcamp back pain, please do leave a comment and let me know.